Students swapped their Shakespeare tales for classic children’s books like “If You Take a Mouse to School” by Laura Numeroff and “Don’t let the Pigeon Drive the Bus” by Mo Willems to join literacy coach Sarah Bearss in walking across the street to read books to kids at Carillon Elementary on Jan. 29. In order to participate, students were nominated by a teacher, coach or sponsor because of their leadership qualities inside and out of the classroom. After arriving at school, they practiced reading their books to make sure they had the cadence and rhythm of story-time reading down-pat before reading to the students at Carillon.
“Encouraging literacy in younger kids is something that I’m really passionate about, so having a chance to work with them was really special,” senior Dynali Weerackoon, who attended the field trip, said. “Literacy goes hand in hand with critical thinking—something that, in today’s society, we could always use more of.”
After arriving at Carillon, students were grouped into teams of four and were assigned classrooms to visit and read to the kids. Each group visited four classrooms in 30-minute increments.
“My group mainly read to kindergarteners and first graders, which was really nice because they get super engaged in our stories,” senior Lila Powell said. “This was something that I knew I wanted to be a part of because my mom is a teacher, so I’ve always really enjoyed interacting with children and being able to read to them was really fun.”
In addition to the field trip, Bearss held several other events this week to celebrate literacy, including a bookmark contest, scavenger hunt and book display within the media center. Classes and clubs joined in on the fun, with National English Honor Society holding a chalk poetry event during lunch on Thursday, and World History teacher Erin Foley had her classes participate in a sustained silent reading day on Wednesday, allowing students to bring a book of their choice to read during their history period.
“Celebrating Literacy Week helps bring us back to the basics that we so often overlook, Bearss said. When kids think about reading, they often think about English class, but the truth of the matter is that literacy is embedded into every single part of our lives.”
